


LANTERN

by kirkhammer



Series: INVENTORY [4]
Category: Bloodborne (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, bloodborne musing, commission! (sort of), forbidden woods
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 08:08:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29913936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirkhammer/pseuds/kirkhammer
Summary: "Certain types of beasts have an abnormal fear of flame"
Series: INVENTORY [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1894123
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	LANTERN

The history of the Hunt, she knows, is written in fire. Yharnam, carved in the shape of shadows it cast.

There, deep in the gathering dark where the Holy Blood was first found, the Forgotten build braziers with the bones of their kin, painting the stones with the settled, waxy musk of old, old death. In woven skeletal cages of iron gleam dripping, ivory candles, dancing with brilliant pink; their colour somehow the same as those beacons of sanity that swirl with the sweet scent of incense, far above. (Like a cross on the door, but also, somehow, not.) In the hidden place, too, flickering orbs of emerald are held in mouldering nets like the first and last catch. Cupped flames light the desiccated archives of scholars and golden chandeliers still glow in the Forsaken Castle’s dead red lungs.

The fire that flooded the valley, until only smouldering stone and blistered skin remained. Still carried on torches and between teeth, locked wild with the taste of blood.

It is even here, where wiry branches coil against the sky like blackened veins, dry leaves shed like scales crunch softly to dust beneath her boots. Here, where finally, under the shadow of the city’s gaping stone maw, tufts of grass press through the dark, soft earth like warm, buried fur. The first breath of night hovers over water like a shroud. Whisperings of distant winter kiss her eyes with unbidden tears. She squints, shields her brow as if from the sun to see it better; glowing through the lingering mist like amber starlight, little limbs of light threading like spider silk in the heavy, wet air.

When was the last time she saw the sun? She doesn’t remember a sky not lit with bone, silver or blood. She had found a gasp of gleaming white through the ancient cracks in the Undertomb. The perfect inverse of a root. It had not warmed her.

It was there, too, she first saw this little light. Dancing in the stale gloom like a sprite. That wrapped, held, precious ember, that hadn’t the snarl of open flame or the hollow gleam of undead eyes. She had seen it and Known it before she even imagined its keeper. For hidden in the core of that lantern was a word she hadn’t realised she’d forgotten.

Strange, that she’d had to crawl to the base of this dead city’s grave to even find the possibility of a Friend. 

But then again, it isn't strange at all. 

**Author's Note:**

> This is for my extremely dear and brilliant friend, Éirinn (whose acute E accent may not be supported by AO3, but is vital, nonetheless.) 
> 
> I have told you so many times with my real human voice how much you mean to me, but something about writing it here, in the vast fluid (ew) transience of the internet seems extremely solid. Like so many things do. Thank you for relenting to my endless yelling of "PLEASE PLAY BLOODBORNE WITH ME" and thank you for, indeed, being undoubtedly the best, smartest, honest-est (?) and most unbelievably gay person I know.
> 
> Not to lower the tone but you (reader who is not my best pal Éirinn) can indeed pay me human money to write one of these for you too! Drop me a message @kirkhammer_ on twitter dot com if you're interested!


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